


Bitter Pastures

by WT Maxwell (WThomas_M)



Category: UFO | Gerry Anderson's UFO
Genre: Gen, Hunting aliens not good for mental health, Who trusts SID?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-05
Updated: 2018-10-05
Packaged: 2020-05-19 02:29:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19347697
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WThomas_M/pseuds/WT%20Maxwell
Summary: A woman in a mental institution is convinced that aliens have co-opted an AI in their plans to harvest the organs of young people and use our bodies as hollowed out puppets. As far as conspiracies go, she's not that far off...





	Bitter Pastures

There are days when the tears wouldn ’t stop, no matter what pills they gave her.

Other days, she wouldn ’t stop screaming.

The best days were red or black. Rage so full that she would tear anything apart if she had the chance. Or a day when everything was so numb that stared out at the world was like looking up from a very deep and very dark well.

The worst days were those when she could remember.

* * *

“You remember you name.”

“Jennifer Stewart, yes.” The doctor seemed nice, even encouraging when he saw he like this.

“What else do you remember? Where are you now, for example?”

“I’m at a private psychiatric facility. I’m supposed to be recovering.” Jennifer gave the doctor a half-smile, which he returned. They both knew the odds on that.

“There are some promising new therapies coming out…”

“I’m sure there are.” This was an exchange they’d had a few times.

“What else?”

“I remember the aliens.”

“Jennifer…” that warning tone.

She leaned forward, the hint of uncontrollable anger in his eyes. He leaned back, automatically. He knew she could be dangerous. She sensed movement behind her. An orderly. A quick shake of the doctor ’s head. Not yet. “I used to fight aliens. I was good at it.”

“Jennifer, we’ve been over this. There’s no such thing as aliens.”

“I figured it out. I did. It all came down to SID.”

“Jennifer, you need to calm down.”

“ _You_ need to tell Straker. Tell him I figured it all out. Regan and Croxley and Foster and Craig and the defection in Ireland and the attack on Moonbase. SID was what they had in common. Glitches that weren’t glitches.”

“Sid was someone you worked with?”

“SID was a computer, an artificial intelligence. He coordinated all of our defenses and that was the key, you see. That was it.” Jennifer leaned forward, conspiratorially. “See, the aliens… they’re not like us. They’re emotionless. They’re not creative. They’re logical, efficient. Machine-like.”

“Machine-like.”

Jennifer pushed out from the desk, in frustration.  “Yes! Machine-like. Or…” she looked confused. “Maybe they are machines and they learned to over-ride the fleshy bits of our brain so they could ride in us like vehicles… or toys.” She started to scratch her head, an obsession that the doctor had noted that could lead to her doing the activity again and again until she bled.

The orderly came over, gently touched her on her shoulder, to break her out of it.  “Would you like a glass of water?” he asked. She nodded and he got her a paper cup full, which she drank. The crushed remnants she left on the desk.

“Maybe they promised SID that he could be just like them, or maybe SID grew to hate us. Maybe that’s why SID betrayed us.”

“Jennifer, can we talk about why you’re really here? About the accident?”

Burning, screaming. She could see them. The fires. Only two years old, strapped into a car seat.

“Jennifer?”

“You have to tell Straker.”

“I will. I promise. Your birthday’s coming up, remember? He always visits then.”

“You’re lying to me.”

* * *

“You’re here.” The tone is Jessie’s voice was one of hope, mixed with just a bit of awe.

He was tall, taller than most people would expect. A shock of neatly combed white hair, a well-groomed mandarin-banded suit and piercing eyes. His smile was tight-lipped, but genuine.  “You did it, Jessie. We found them.” He handed her a folder. The orderly next to him looked nervous.

Jessie bit a knuckle, nervously, before opening up the folder. Then, a little laugh burst from her, tension releasing. She was crying. She put a hand on Straker ’s shoulder. “Thank you.” She gave him a hug, which he returned. “Thank you.” She moved back to the bed and began reading over the pages in earnest.

They were all blank.

Straker watched her for a moment, sadly, and then accompanied the orderly outside, leaving Jessie delighted.

The orderly kept it together only for a moment.  “You… I don’t think you should be encouraging her delusion.”

“You’re new here, aren’t you?”

The orderly nodded.

“I own a film studio.” Straker sighed. “We had this perfect sci-fi script. It had everything in it. Aliens, organ transplants. She was playing the heroine. At one point in the script, she was supposed to accuse Sid—he was a computer programmer in charge of security—of betraying everyone to the aliens, but it turns out they were listening in to the electromagnetic transmissions coming off the computer. Sid hadn’t betrayed them and she figures it out in time to save the day and stop a UFO invasion.”

The orderly nodded, wondering where this was going. Straker sighed and pinched his nose.  “We had the money shot all set up. The UFO exploding. Her family was there, on set, to watch. But… something happened. The FX went off too soon and… there were a lot of casualties that day. Her family didn’t make it. And she, well…”

The orderly looked at Jessie, who had finished the  ‘report’ and was looking contentedly out the window.

“It’s not much. Get her the best help available. Hope they can make some progress we couldn’t. But until then, I owe it to her. I owe it… do you understand?”

The orderly nodded.

Straker waited until the orderly retrieved the report, climbed into his Zephyr IV, and drove away.


End file.
